The Poem's Two Bodies: The Poetics of the 1590 Faerie Queene

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The role of the human body as a poetic and ideological construct in the 1590 Faerie Queene provides the point of departure for David Lee Miller's richly detailed treatment of Spenser's allegory. In this major contribution to the study of Renaissance literature and ideology, Miller finds the poem organized by a fantasy of bodily wholeness that, like

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"David Lee Miller's thesis in The Poem's Two Bodies is simple, far-reaching, and important; concentrating upon the problematical 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene, Miller argues that 'the aesthetic body of Spenser's poem mirrors the socio-political body of Tudor ideology.' From this premise, Miller proceeds to a close and systematic reading of The Faerie Queene; he carefully explores the ways in which Spenser's poetics encounter Elizabethan politics; and he demonstrates the staggering difficulty of Spenser's own situation as an imperial poet... The Poem's Two Bodies is a valuable essay in politics and the English language, diligently executed and repeatedly satisfying in its conclusions. It deserves, and will doubtless command, close and prolonged attention."--Bruce Thomas Boehrer, Sixteenth Century Journal